


swan song of the red god

by larkspear



Category: Silent Hill (Video Game Series)
Genre: Gen, Meta Bullshit, Other, Post-Canon, honestly i don't even know what this is
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-15
Updated: 2017-01-15
Packaged: 2018-09-17 19:15:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,897
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9339266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/larkspear/pseuds/larkspear
Summary: Heather becomes something she never wanted to be OR After all this time the town doesn't let her go OR Silent Hill dies, and maybe that's a good thing.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I called this an "impulse fic" for a reason - I wrote it on a bit of a whim, and left it pretty raw and unpolished once finished. Sorry. 
> 
> Basically a concept fic: how do you put the rise and fall of the series into a context of its own world? How do you explain Konami's meddling? There are some other scenes or characters or concepts I should have expanded more, or even given them their own fic, but I wanted to put out something to flesh out this concept first. 
> 
> Also: don't take the metaphor too literally. Heather isn't suppose to be a metaphor for Konami or anything, just... see if you can roll with it. 
> 
> To avoid making these notes too long I'll stop here, but please give feedback if you'd like more author's notes on this.

* * *

 “It has been a long time, I know,” She said.  
She said, “Aren’t you tired?"

\- Gabriel King, _The Golden Cat_

 

* * *

 

Things end.

(These things never end.)

 

Heather mourns her father the way she doesn’t want to, the way she should have known she would always have to: alone, and covered in blood.

More than anything, she just needs some time alone. And for the first and last time, Silent Hill grants her a kindness: it gives her just that.

  
  
  


_a wheezing gasp, like someone dying or creaking metal:_ **_HEATHER-_ **

  
  
  


It’s not something she notices then, she’s too preoccupied with grief and exhaustion. When she finds Douglas she feels something like relief, the realization that things might actually be okay. Maybe that’s when she notices it.

Heather definitely notices it as they pick their way carefully out of the hellhole that is Silent Hill and back to where Douglas’ car is. Her still-new instincts sent her scrounging for ammo to fend off whatever waves of monsters blocked their path... but there hadn’t been any. Had they all died with the god?

No: on their way out, she sees figures in the distance. At the edge of the fog shapes that shift unnaturally and gurgle terrible noises. But they don’t come close, just linger at the edge and _watch_. Like they’re scared of something.

 _Like they’re scared of me_ , she thinks on impulse. Heather buries that thought before the ramifications of it can hit. As they leave and the fog falls away she hears a grinding noise that almost sounds like a name.

 

* * *

 

That’s where it should end. Drive away from Silent Hill into the sunset, cast one last concerned look back and see the mist fall away. Try to use her old name and still pretend it doesn’t feel weird. Go bury her father and visit his grave and break down a few times. Piece together the shattered parts of her life slowly and heal.  Let Silent Hill become nothing but distant memories, just a name and a speck on the map. Move on.

Except, it doesn’t end there. Sure, all those things happen, but something hangs on, like some part of that cursed town crawled right up inside her. She has... dreams. At first, she takes the dreams as just trauma and Alessa-memories, which, yeah, she’s not getting away from.

But... but then the dreams stop making sense. Not that these sort of things should make sense, but there’s a clear difference. Dreams of burning alive, of demon nurses in dark hospital corridors, of endless roads filled with fog that go nowhere? That’s what she expects. She doesn’t expect dreams of misty graveyards and dark museums filled with holes, of old hotels that smell like death and the terrible grinding sound of something metal being dragged.

Heather very distinctly doesn’t remember the beast with the red pyramid for a head. She would remember something like that.

And maybe she could chalk it up to an overactive imagination twisted by that place (hey, how much shit jumped directly out of her mind to stalk the streets back when she was Alessa, huh?) but so much of it seems out of nowhere. A man rows across a misty lake. A woman with a butterfly tattoo says _do i look like your girlfriend_ ? She can almost feels the chill of the freezer, and the heat of the staircase burning ( _fuck you dreams fuck you fuck YOU_ ) and she hears, no, FEELS the name Mary, Mary, Mary.

One night, while staring at her ceiling at another one of these Mary dreams, she realizes: it’s not a dream. It’s a vision.

...Well, maybe that’s not the right word. But it figures, right? She’s got all these memories from Alessa floating around in her head now, it was only a matter of time until the powers came along too. Maybe she’ll get telekinesis soon. The thought makes her shiver.

No, no, that’s not right either. It takes her a while and more dreams to realize she feels like it’s something being fed from a drip, like listening to a conversation through a telephone wire, _like she’s looking through the town’s eyes-_

When she confesses to Douglas one day over breakfast that she’s worried Silent Hill still has her, and describes her dreams, he reassures her in that raspy calm Douglas way. Heather feels better but the dreams don’t go away.

Nothing comes for her. No monsters, no Otherworld, just dreams. Dreams and the nagging feeling of being somewhere else at the same time, but that’s not really new.

Heather thinks about the figures on the edge of the mist when she left. Watching. In her dreams, nurses and shiny mannequins with too many legs scramble away from the thing with the pyramid head. Maybe...

One night she dreams of an ending. It feels as if it’s a foregone conclusion anyway, like this all happened long ago.

That’s not the end of the dreams, though. They come in waves, pulsing like blood through veins. Different people. Different endings. At the very least, it’s not like insomnia is anything new.

“I’m going to find a way to stop this,” Heather promises Silent Hill.

 

* * *

 

Ashfield isn’t a particularly nice city, but she can’t really complain. Douglas’ apartment matches him and matches the city but it’s got a guest room he lets her move into because, well, where else was she supposed to go?

And it would be all well and good and she could maybe even be fine with the dreams but something starts to happen. Something curls in her head and she can practically feel Silent Hill tremble and she somehow knows: it’s hungry. More than that, it’s desperate for something. There is a terrible creaking and grinding that sounds like _HEATHER_.

Is it because she took all her Alessa parts back into herself? Is it because she went there? Did they see her killing god and somehow think it was a contest of dominance? The cult had said _and god created the red god xuchilbara and the yellow god lobsel vith_ but maybe they were wrong and they meant: _and she becomes the red god born in fire and blood and born on suffering of others and left bleeding on the floor with a bullet to the face and then rises THE YELLOW GOD_

_Because blondes have more fun, don’t you think?_

The thought makes her blood run cold. Being made a saint was bad enough. The idea’s ridiculous but the place feels like it’s calling to her and she worries.

Something happens in an apartment complex on the south side of the city. It’s not until she and Douglas read the newspaper articles about it and see the little details that don’t fit together and she feels sick to her stomach.

Did she come here because it was here? Or did it come here because she was here?

“No more,” Heather promises Silent Hill.

 

* * *

 

Eventually, she begins to reach back. Not push back, not yet, but reach back. She can feel the tether between her and she can feel it back until she can feel the whole town, and it almost feels like she could push something and it would _fall-_

(It’s hard to describe. Back when she was a kid, she used to have dreams of doing strange things she couldn’t describe. Back when she was Alessa, she tried to describe it to Claudia and words always fell short. No, it’s not like feeling something with your hands. It doesn’t feel like anything the way most things too. You have to feel it to understand.)

So, finally: she starts to push back. Monsters crawl back into their holes to sleep. The mist gets thinner sometimes, just a little. Less people get pulled in, and the dreams fade a little. The town writhes under her pressure and practically screeches.

The small victories are something she takes in stride all alone, in the dark. She doesn’t tell Douglas, because how could she? Despite everything, he doesn’t quite get the Alessa thing. So, in the dark she reaches up towards the ceiling and feels Silent Hill shift.

Heather doesn’t want whatever this power and this connection is, but if she’s got it she might as well try to do something good with it.

 

* * *

 

Silent Hill pushes back, eventually.

It curls its talons where it has a hold in her mind and something aches. Old memories well up like blood, dreams more vivid than usual. She sees, no, remembers things, things from the _really_ bad times. She walks around in her old projection and leads the trucker to the pieces she needs, waltzing through both his traumas and her own.

A fleeting memory: the trucker brings down the beast that was born from her memories of a Caliban costume, and she kicks it for good measure. She’s always liked Shakespeare, but she’s got some taste.

There is _always_ the fire. The power games and the puzzle and the feeling of finally being split (that, now, that is a strange experience when you’ve got the memories of both parts, oh boy), but more than anything she remembers the _burning_.

Alessa couldn’t spare anything to wonder what happened to the trucker afterwards, but Heather does. She thinks of him and wonders. It must have been a long time ago.

The town curls its claws again, lashes out. Sometimes she wakes up and clutches herself until she’s reassured her flesh isn’t charred and peeling. Douglas is used to her waking up to night terrors, but he still sometimes gives her concerned looks over breakfast.

It comes down to this: in the darkness of her room she throws off the covers because it feels like the room’s on FIRE and Heather just glares into the nothing. “Is that the best you’ve got?”

Silent Hill retreats, eventually. Most of the way.

  
  
  
  


_a wheezing gasp, like someone dying or creaking metal:_ **_ALESSA-_ **

 

* * *

 

Despite all her best efforts, Silent Hill still manages to get people to stumble into its gaping maw and then chew them up. Sometimes she likes to think she’s weakened it, at least a little, from where she pushes and pulls at it from miles and miles away. She likes to believe that more people, at the very least, end up like her: stumbling out, worse for the wear but still in one piece.

It’s hard to say if it’s actually true.

The ebb and flow of her grit teeth and staring at the back of her eyelids thinking no more gets interrupted without warning by a strange shifting. Silent Hill lurches up and turns its ugly head at somewhere else. Just as it had reached out to Ashfield before it reaches out again-

Shepherd’s Glen? She doesn’t recognize the name, not even in her Alessa-memories.

After a lot of digging, it becomes clear why. It’s not the kind of place one wants to remember, she supposes. The articles never detail the specifics but she’s gotten very good at reading between the lines and seeing where one world ends and the beast of a town begins.

So... Heather sits with the map of Toluca lake spread out on the table more than a few nights. With her finger, she traces the miles between Shepherd’s Glen and Silent Hill. Every moment she feels it loom over the other town and, well...

Heather can’t go to Silent Hill. Not yet, she’s not- she should, she _should_ , but she can’t. But maybe she can go to Shepherd’s Glen.

Douglas worries once she announces what she’s doing. Of course he worries. She’s worried, too. But she’s got to do something, right? It’s not like she can sit around and let Silent Hill keep ripping people apart the way it ripped her apart.

It’s just like old times, so she packs the reliable stuff. A flashlight, a knife, a gun and some ammo, the old sword. Heather stares at an empty locket for a long time before leaving.

(On the last stretch of the way there, she gets a ride from a trucker. Says his name is Travis Grady. She wonders if he realizes who she is, realizes it’s probably better if he doesn’t.)

Shepherd’s Glen is already a shitshow. The fog has started creeping in and the walls of the buildings look decayed and faded. Most of the people are gone or too scared to come out of their houses.

If there’s monsters, they’re too afraid to come out and see her.

The thing is... she doesn’t know what she’s doing. Her heart pounds in her ear every moment and wouldn’t it have been easier if she’d just learned to do that old projection trick again, instead of coming all the way here? Too late now!

A sloppy red symbol sits on one of the decaying walls on one of the buildings. It’s not quite _that_ symbol, it’s a little too simple, like someone couldn’t quite remember it or was drawing it as fast as they could. If she hadn’t recognized it as the work of a fanatical hell cult, she would have almost felt pity for the artist.

The stone brick walls outside what she thinks might be a cemetery are damp and dirty, but she still sits at the top of one and stares into the distance. Silent Hill is not so eager to feed on the town while she’s here, or so she hopes. It risks only a slow creep into the town, one she figures will take years for it to fully fill the place. It’s a start.

In the distance, a shadow moves. Hard to tell if it’s a figure or a _figure_. She kicks her feet in the air and feels the satisfying faint thump as her heels hit the stone of the wall. The feeling grounds her. Next thing she knows, the figure is gone.

The thing is, she can’t stay here forever. The mist sits still and almost taunts her. In her frustration she grabs her knife and just, just throws it because she feels like breaking something.

It’s like leaving something of herself, she rationalizes when the knife disappears into the mist. A little sacrifice. Maybe that will keep it restrained.

The next morning, Heather leaves Shepherd’s Glen. It lets her.

 

 

(It will be years before it is fully faded. Someday, someone with the curse of the town on them will pick up a knife, any knife, and look towards Shepherd’s Glen. They’ll carry that blessing with them, Heather’s gift, a little something to help kill a part of Silent Hill.)

* * *

 

It creeps back into her dreams again with its grimy claws, but this time hurts more.

No more old memories and _alessa alessa_ but just her father’s voice calling _CHERYL_ and twisting everything she knows. It shows her Silent Hill that’s more normal and shouldn’t be and forces her to watch her father run and whispers _look look it’s you it’s you look your father is DEAD don’t you SEE_ again and again.

She tries to tell herself it’s not Harry, that’s not what he’s like, and every time the town listens paints him again and different but never right.

Kaufmann smiles at her again and pretends to (tries to) help. There are sweet glimpses of a normal life for her, a life without burning and without cults but the price is always Harry’s corpse and she can’t, she can’t.

The cold sweat she wakes up in make her feel like she woke up at the bottom of a frozen Toluca lake.

Her own wounds ache under the pressure of Silent Hill’s claws. Is this it’s retribution? She shudders and hates to admit that it’s working.

“ _No more_ ,” Heather promises into the dark.

  
  
  


_a wheezing gasp, like someone dying or creaking metal:_ **_CHERYL-_ **

 

* * *

 

It churns and lashes out in strange ways. Desperate clawing and a screeching temptation: _wouldn’t you like to change it all-?_

Really, Heather just wants it to end. Instead it’s like the tides. Push and pull. Push and pull.

 

* * *

 

Still. Something had changed it. She has changed it. Like the tides, it rises up as it has so many times before, repeats the old story and the old torment - but weaker, crippled, a dog without teeth.

(It rains more in the town. Even through the torrenting downpour she knows it’s just sound and fury. All the water of Toluca Lake couldn’t wash away the blood and the sins... but it’s a start.)

The great maw of Silent Hill devours stragglers not with a roar, but a whimper.

 

* * *

 

Time passes. Years, maybe.

_a wheezing gasp, like someone dying or creaking metal..._

 

* * *

 

It comes back to her dreams, after being silent for so long. It’s quieter this time, creeping closer on careful feet. All the dreams show her is fog and that’s all it really needs to show her, but the fog churns and she feels a voice says: _the only me is me. are you sure the only you is you?_

Heather (because the part of her that looks the town dead in the eyes has always been Heather. Cheryl is another life and another story that Silent Hill _doesn’t get to see_ ) remembers her promise and decides it’s finally time to go back.

It’s time to go home.

 

* * *

 

In the end, she can’t decide if it’s coincidence or something deeper that gets Travis to give her a ride again.

“I need a ride to Silent Hill,” she says, almost apologetic.  
“That’s not a good place to go,” he replies. “There’s something dark going on there.”  
“I know,” Heather replies.

He takes her there without another protest. If he ever figured it out, he said nothing. Maybe it’s better that way - it’s about time that past gets laid to rest.

After all, that’s all she’s ever wanted. Ever since she was seven the first time. Oh, she is so tired.

 

* * *

 

It’s exactly like she remembers it. It’s nothing like she remembers it.

The road stretches dark and long before her, distant street lights beckoning. The welcome sign sits old and decayed and she’s surprised nobody’s written the word HELL over the name, but then again who’s left here to do that? Maybe it’s a good sign that everyone had abandoned even this surface world, that now it’s as dark and desolate as the other layers of this damned hell pit.

On the cracked pavement into town she sees drawn in white the symb... No, it’s not the symbol. It’s just three circles. It’s not even red. Heather draws a triangle over them anyways. It’s not the Halo, and the Seal of Metatron never did shit, but it’s an old superstitious habit.

Tradition, she supposes. Old habits die hard.

As Heather walks back into the town she feels it stir beneath her. The way it shudders she can almost feel it bleed into her, a dam about to break or a scared animal. But more than anything it is preoccupied by the first real meal it’s had in years. Real, honest tension ripples through the aura of the town like she hasn’t seen since - since - since _she_ was here. For a moment, the old fear comes back.

It rises up again like an old beast preparing for the last hunt. But when she gets closer and sees the parting of its great maw, its legs begin to shake and Silent Hill collapses on itself. Not in the way the weird widower would notice, or the trapped stranger, not the trucker, not the Shepherd boy or the convict. Not even her father. It crumples deep down inside itself in the way only she can see because she is flesh and blood of this town, find the label on her that says _made in Silent Hill, trademarked_. Heather knows what nobody else knows: the fire in the heart of the town is burning out, the last log falling into the ashes.

(In her dreams, in her memories, in her flesh there is a fire-)

Heather swallows her fear and follows the proverbial scent of smoke.

 

* * *

 

There is a door. It leads into what looks like a house, but things sometimes aren’t what they seem. Heather leans against the damp wall of a nearby alley, just out of the light of the nearby street lamp, and watches the door open.

The man who comes out is- well. He seems like the regular kind of victim for this. Average looking with something dark in his demeanor that comes from carrying too heavy a burden. It takes a long time to learn to hide that, she knows.

He emerges from whatever hellscape he saw on the other side of that door and Silent Hill opens its maw to swallow him whole. Heather thinks NO MORE and reaches out into the fabric of the town, where the seams between worlds is, and _pulls_.

The man walks out onto the streets to a clear night sky and walks out of Silent Hill forever. If he knows what’s best he’ll keep walking, maybe until he reaches the sea.

But starving the place is not enough. She needs to stamp out the fire. So Heather reaches out again and tugs and lets herself go down down _down_.

She goes through the door.

 

* * *

 

Really, it’s about what she expects. Dark and narrow and spiralling on and on. Something is watching her, always behind her, but it’s fuzzy and distorted because it was never meant for her. It (she?) wheezes and cries softly but never gets too close to Heather. Maybe it’s afraid of her. Maybe it’s watching to see what she does.

Or maybe, it’s just tired.

Heather goes into the bathroom because that feels right. The sink and the bathtub are stained with old blood. The mirror is grimy and scratched off in some places, but not so much that she can’t see her reflection. Of course it would have to be a mirror. Silent Hill sneers and the reflection is Alessa.

“Oh, _come on_ ,” Heather groans. “Aren’t you getting tired of all this?”

The shadow of a figure cuts across the room from the doorway. The creature watches her.

“Don’t give me that,” Heather snaps. “I made a promise. I’m here to make good on it.”

The mirror flickers with the image of flames behind her. It tries to shift to something else to scare her, but she shakes her head.

“And you know what? I think you’re not even going to stop me,” Heather says.

Heather says, “I think you know that it’s about time you finally got some rest.”

The door creaks. The figure of the crying woman is gone and in her place is a metal pipe. Heather picks it up gingerly and weighs it in her hand for a moment while she stares at the mirror.

  
  
  


 

 _a wheezing gasp, like someone dying or creaking metal:_ **_please_ **

Heather keeps her promise and shatters the mirror.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


* * *

 

It’s a small headline, at the bottom of the front page: _Ghost Town Silent Hill Burns in Mysterious Fire_. Nobody knows why, says the article, but it hardly matters. The last residents cleared out years ago - only ghosts burned. Now it will only ever be a distant memory, just a name and a speck on the map.

Cheryl folds up the newspaper and puts it away.

 

* * *

 

Things end.

(Sometimes, these things do end.)


End file.
